


Azure and Obsidian

by DragonflyxParodies



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: ? - Freeform, Agni Meddles, Airbender Ty Lee (Avatar), Arranged Marriage, Azula (Avatar) Redemption, Canonical Child Abuse, Civil War, F/F, F/M, Firelord Azula (Avatar), IT'S GAY, M/M, OT3, Ozai (Avatar) is an Asshole, Ozai doesn't know what hit him, Protective Azula (Avatar), Protective Zuko (Avatar), Self-Harm, Treason, mild body horror, off-screen/implied violence against women
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:28:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27210463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonflyxParodies/pseuds/DragonflyxParodies
Summary: In which Zuko strives to protect his sister in the only way he can, and Azula has always valued loyalty over all else.
Relationships: Azula & Ozai (Avatar), Azula & The Gaang (Avatar), Azula & Zuko (Avatar), Azula/Mai/Ty Lee, Iroh & Zuko (Avatar), Mai & Zuko (Avatar), Ozai & Zuko (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar), The Gaang & Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Mai (Avatar), Ty Lee & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 88
Kudos: 602
Collections: A:tla





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> im  
> in an atla kick okay

Mom’s been gone a year when Zuko commits treason for her.

He’s eleven, she’s nine. She gets out of her lessons early and collects her girls and decides to pay her dear brother a visit. She bounces into the sad little plot of weeds and sand Father had designated Zuzu’s training arena, and stops so quickly that Ty Lee bumps into her shoulder with a barely audible little _eep_.

Zuzu missteps, as he so often does, and stumbles in the kata. His tutor – trainer? Master? Azula _knows_ they’re competent firebenders, but it isn’t as if Father’s wasting _good_ coin on them either, and titles are _earned –_ snaps something and waves a hand and -

\- brings a whip of fire down _hard_ on her brother’s back.

She registers the burns then. Scars. She recognizes those _she’s_ given him, but some of them are half-hidden and twisted and _covered_ by cuts and bruises and –

When she comes back to herself, Zuzu’s trainer is on the ground with a perfect rivulet taken right out of his cheek. His robes are aflame. She does not bend them away, and the man is cowering too fiercely to do it himself.

“What kind of _worm_ do you think you are to have the authority to strike one of Sozin’s _own?”_ She demands, and she does not recognize the chill to her own voice. She pauses, savors the _fright_ of it, and tucks it away for later.

“Lala—”

She flicks her hand dismissively at the rodent at her feet, and Mai steps up to handle the rest. Ty Lee catches her eyes as she turns to her brother, and _beams_ at her.

“I know you’re a disappointment and all, Zuzu, but _this_ is a new low.”

He’s staring at her with wide eyes and trembling hands, and he doesn’t even seem to be aware of the skin crackling and bleeding as he pulls himself up to attention.

“As pathetic as you are, you’re still the _Crown Prince_. You’re Sozin’s blood, one of the Great Dragons. And you let some common little _leech_ lay his hands on you? What do you think that says about _me?_ ”

Distantly, she recognizes that she’s furious over it. Blood-boiling, fingers-sparking, eyes-flashing, _ready-to-kill_ furious. And her stupid, insolent brother tightens his jaw and looks her dead in the eye.

“Father instructed him to use any method necessary to make me _better_ , Zula.” He’s wild-eyed. Desperate.

She sneers. Watches out of the corner of her eye as the cockroach-fly _flees_ into the castle, robes still smoldering.

“Then I guess you’ll have to choose whether you’d rather dishonor _me_ or Father.” She says, and turns on her heel in a perfect pivot. Her girls follow her out, exactly a half-step behind her at either shoulder. She catches a glimpse of their expressions, when they reenter the palace. Ty Lee looks like she’s just hung the moon in the sky. And Mai looks _proud_.

“You asked your bother to commit treason.” Mai says quietly, once they are safely sequestered away on the rooftops with snacks as deserving of their position. Azula snorts. Stills, when she realized, _yes_ , she _had_.

“It’s not like it’ll ever amount to anything. _He’ll_ never amount to anything.” She says dismissively, and Mai simply nods and moves on.

But the realization _lingers_.

X

She creeps across the rooftops to watch his next training session.

Zuzu stumbles, like he always does. His teacher, a new one this time, draws her hand back – and Zuzu catches it before it can do anything other than spark.

“Oh, _shit.”_ Ty Lee breathes beside her.

_Oh shit_ indeed.


	2. Chapter 2

“You love him.” She says, and Mai’s face does something funny before she turns her entire body to face Azula, away from the courtyard where Zuko is feeding those damned turtleducks again.

“What?”

Her hands shake, just a little.

“You pay attention to him. You talk about him all the time. Lucky for you, _I_ can handle your parents.”

Ty Lee is still and expressionless at Mai’s side. Mai glances down, at Azula’s hands.

“Azula, what happened?” She asks slowly, softly.

She swallows back the – the dark leering and the shadows and the way her blood had curdled in her veins, and meets Mai’s gaze head-on.

Zuzu still fed the turtleducks at Mother’s pond. Still helped the little monstrosities free when they got twisted up in pondweed. Still nodded and thanked the servants, still looked scandalized when Azula insulted her girls.

“He’s a disappointment and a failure but he’s still the Crown Prince. He’s certainly the closest _you’ll_ ever get to something _decent_ here.” She stresses the words as much as she dares, when she does not know who will overhear them.

Mai’s face pales, then. She’s a proper Fire Nation lady. So is Azula. Ty Lee swallows visibly, and knots her hands in her lap. She isn’t, but she’s been around them long enough to understand.

Azula’s presence protects Ty Lee. It does no such thing for Mai.

“How’d you know?” Mai says. Azula smiles, but it is wooden.

“At least I’ll have a sister-in-law I can tolerate.” She says, and Mai reaches down and takes Ty Lee’s hand. If Ty Lee reaches out and takes Azula’s, holds it so tightly her bones ache, no one is any the wiser.

X

“Your arm needs to be higher.” She says, and Zuzu looks up at her in surprise. He adjusts his stance accordingly, without saying anything, and this time the gout of flames that spiral from his fist is not entirely pathetic.

“What do you need?” He asks, and he just – _looks_ at her, like –

Something burns in her throat.

He drops to the dirt, and her blue flame only singes the air where his shoulder had been.

“Why do you _do that?!”_ She snarls, and even as the words leave her mouth cold _fear_ washes over her because she just –

It’s the anniversary of their mother’s disappearance, and Zuko is crouching in front of her, looking up at her with a pinched expression _she does not recognize_.

“I _know_ you agree with her.” She say fiercely, voice low. Zuko _blinks_ , and then frowns.

“Mom?”

“Do you even _want_ to be Fire Lord?” She snaps, rather than answer him.

Zuko’s eyes flick to the dirt, and she feels cold again.

“…You don’t.”

“Father’s – right. You’d make the better Fire Lord.”

She has a thousand thoughts, in that moment, with her brother’s confession soft and _factual_ between the two of them.

Only two stick. _Of course_ , and _you’re wrong_.

She is a monster. Mother had said it best, after all, and Azula can hold a thousand and one things against the woman, but she never _lied_.

But –

There is the distant sound of a door opening.

They spring apart. Azula vanishes back inside, and Zuzu falls into his katas as if he never stopped.

They do not finish their conversation.

X

“ _Monster.”_

The sound of flesh hitting flesh.

She turns.

The noblewoman is older than her. Not quite yet a _real_ adult, but – no longer a child, either. She is beautiful in reds and golds and hair spun up with gold thread and rubies at her ears, at her throat, matching her mouth and khol-lined eyes.

Zuko looks at her as if he’s never seen anything more disgusting in his life.

There is something boiling in her breast.

“That is _your Princess_ you just insulted.”

He never, she thinks, would have hit a servant. The woman remains frozen, face pale and red where Zuko had struck her.

Deceptively casual, Azula wanders over. Her heels click like gongs with every step.

The woman’s eyes dart to her, though she doesn’t dare move her head. Her fright is a visceral thing, as she drops to the floor, prostate.

“Zuzu, did _you_ let the pest into the palace?”

“Not this time.” He says evenly, and Azula smiles, lifts her hand and flicks her fingers. Two guards stand ready before her fingers have even stopped moving. She looks at them, memorizes their faces. It is so _hard_ to find competent help.

“There seems to have been some mistake. Put the creature in the cow-pig pen where it belongs. And keep a better eye out, next time. We can’t have _vermin_ muddying up the Fire Lord’s banquets, can we?”

“No, Princess.”

They stand back and watch the guards rip the sobbing little _thing_ off the floor and drag her off. A servant approaches, bows apologetically, and begins scrubbing the floor clean of tears and makeup. Zuzu quietly thanks the boy.

“We’re at war.” He says, once the boy has finished and fled and it is just the two of them standing there in that hallway.

“How astute.” She says dryly, and raises one perfect eyebrow at him. Her expression mostly holds. She can’t help the – the wavering.

He’d breathed sparks until the woman was out of sight.

“It’s my duty to look out for you, Zula.” He says quietly. She’s not sure if she summons the rage that flashes through her, or if he does.

“I don’t need _you –“_

“I know you don’t. Not like that.”

It is the most conniving thing her brother has ever said in his _life_ , and she’s so shocked by it she can’t gather the words to reply.

“The Fire Nation _needs_ you, Zula. It – needs a dragon more than it needs a turtleduck.”

It’s the first time he _verbalizes_ treason.

He hesitates a moment, staring at her frozen expression searchingly, and then dips his head at her and steps past her.

“Don’t be daft, Zuzu. You’re far too _ugly_ to be a turtleduck.” She rasps when her voice returns to her, just before his footsteps fade completely. There is a moment of silence.

She thinks she hears him huff a laugh before he disappears.

X

Azula does not get to say goodbye.

The secret passage in her closet slides open with the soft chime of a bell, and her girls are crawling into bed with her before she can even flick a flame to the candle at her bedside.

“Why aren’t you with him?” She rasps. Mai snorts, and slings an arm over her.

“As if he needs me.”

That strikes her _cold_.

“You gotta have _sleep_ b’fore you can think up a plan, Zula.” Ty Lee mumbles into her shoulder, and the acrobat tosses _her_ arm over Azula’s _other_ side, and she’s hemmed in now so completely by them –

“I’m going to the Temple in the morning.” She says clearly, and feels her determination settle into her _bones_. It – _she –_ peels away all the other emotions she is _not_ feeling, throws them aside.

“What for?”

“Can’t an honorable and devout princess pay her respects to the Great Sun Spirit?” She asks, and her voice does _not_ shudder.

Ty Lee is straddling her in the next heartbeat, eyes big and luminous in the dark.

“What’d they miss?” Mai asks, still as stone beside her. Azula lets herself blink up at Ty Lee, and squeezes her hands into fists around her bedsheets.

They wore prayer-shawls into an Agni Kai. Zuko had taken his off carefully, respectfully. Father had shrugged his off and stepped over it.

In the chaos of the Crown Prince’s dishonor, no one but Azula had seen her father’s shawl burn to cinders.

“I will _not_ let another’s dishonorable actions reflect poorly on _me_.” She hisses.

It’s the first time _she_ verbalizes treason.

And, after a heartbeat –

“Father did not _intend_ for Zuzu to crawl off that stage.” She breathes, the barest of whispers.

Ty Lee’s lips are dry and warm on her forehead.

“I’ll pray with you.” She says softly.

Mai sighs _directly_ into her ear, and Azula scowls.

“It’s not like I have anything better to do.”

X

Azula helps them up, and looks up at the great statue of Agni, glowing molten in the sunlight pouring in through the Temple’s windows. Mai makes a show of dusting her skirts off.

That thing that has been bubbling and writhing and _twisting_ inside of her for three years is still, now. Cold.

“Mai? You’re going to write a letter.”

_Obsidian_.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW for uuuuhhhh. Azula rendering herself infertile. Read w/caution at "she summons cold fire" until the end of that section.

_dragon child_ , it calls her, and Azula stares down at the bright red-black _burn_ of the Fire Nation and _scowls_.

_You want Zuzu_. She says, and looks up to meet the creature before her head-on.

She knows what a dragon looks like; but this is somehow _more_ , even if it weren’t molten gold and lava, sunlight stretched gossamer thin between star-bones and heat like silk.

_your hatch-mate is mine,_ it says, and she’s _growling_ before she knows what she’s doing.

This is a dream, she thinks. She’s more than a little bewildered by it; she’s prayed to Agni exactly once in her life and it has not been _recent_ in any sense of the word. But – _Zuzu_ is the stupid little fluffy turtleduck quacking at their spirts-addled uncle’s heels. She’s above such superstitions. Mostly.

_you have duties,_ it rumbles, and sweeps its tail like a cresting sunrise over the Fire Nation below, and Azula is lunging before she can even think –

The Caldera is black, not with soot and ash but _rot_. She recoils, throws herself backwards as ferociously as she’d thrown herself _forward_ , and something uncomprehendingly warm and _steady_ envelopes her.

There are bodies. Eaten and shriveled by the rot, the pale ivory of their bones winking up at her like stars.

_your people are poisoned, dragon child_.

_What do I care?_ She snarls. There is a hum.

_they are yours, are they not?_

She sees her father, a figure like him, crown tarnished and pocket-marked, rise from the rot. Where he steps, the rot grows stronger. Spreads.

A weight settles on her head.

_he has been taking them from you since your birth._

She wakes, Zuko’s name on her lips and blood on her tongue.

X

She cannot learn to love the Fire Nation because she is not capable of love.

But taking? Owning? Those are things she knows well. Those are things Zuzu knows she knows.

And what follows are the most frustrating, exhausting, and trying years of her life.

Mai catches her wrist in her bare hand the next time Azula goes to burn a servant. And while the little _animals_ cower and scramble away from her, Mai says just loudly enough to be heard – “ _he’s not here.”_

She lets the heat gathered at her fingertips dissipate with a sneer, and grinds her teeth to dust as Mai scoops up the fallen silks and continues dressing her, as if she herself is nothing more than a _servant_.

Ty Lee begins nudging her out of her routine, into the right rooms at the right time. Ty Lee’s methods are, perhaps, more effective. The palace belongs to the royal family; it, and its staff, are things that Azula has no problem claiming _ownership_ of. To see some minor noble try to lay his hands on her maids is offense enough to warrant the man’s sniveling and scorched flesh, more than enough for her to keep an eye on any suspicious limping or bruising on her staff.

Her girls let her snarl and burn the pathetic little things when they try to show _gratitude_ or thank her or look at her with their big, _stupid_ eyes –

And it helps cover for her…change in _motive_ , if not action. Father certainly doesn’t pick up on it. The servants still flinch when she makes eye contact with them and smiles during dinner – so.

She’s frankly angrier that her father is here, tripping off that spirits-damned pedestal he’d built for himself, then that she can’t burn anymore.

It isn’t _enough_.

X

Zuzu loses his mind about a year and a half into his banishment. The letter is absolute nonsense, not even coded, and is nothing but four rambling pages, front and back, of proverbs.

“It’s a _hypothetical_.” Mai says, as if _the young cherry blossom blooming in the shade of a rotting oak_ is a sentence that makes _sense_. Azula knows hypotheticals; knows how to maneuver around them and through them and between them. Hypotheticals are _if then_ scenarios.

Ty Lee snatches the letter from Mai’s hands while Mai stares flatly at her, and very loudly starts _talking_.

“No, it’s a fairytale! See! ‘ _And then the spirit came home and found his garden barren and ash.’_. Oh, it’s a _boring_ fairytale.” She tosses the letter back, but her smile is too wide and too bright and a flash of heat races down Azula’s spine as she thinks of her dream.

Uncle, she realizes, has been teaching Zuzu how to think and use these _stupid_ proverbs.

And Uncle has been spouting out these _stupid proverbs_ probably since he came crawling out of Grandmother’s womb.

And if they’re hypotheticals, if they are _stories_ , then –

She realizes her breath is smoking.

She can tolerate Zuzu plotting without her, because he’s a good little turtleduck and can’t keep a secret from her to save his life. But this means _Uncle_ is trying his hand at politics, that Uncle _has been,_ and –

It won’t matter what _Zuzu_ says if their Uncle says something _different_.

“It’s gibberish.” She announces, and stalks over to her desk. She yanks out a quill and a fresh sheet of parchment with so much force it takes conscious effort to prevent flames from licking their way up her wrists.

“Teach me.” She orders, and Mai rolls her eyes but slides into Azula’s desk without complaint and Ty Lee salutes and bounces out the door.

“The whole garden knows that the dead oak is poisoning their soil. But the spirit’s love for his favorite saplings keeps _them_ healthy.” Mai drawls, smoothing Zuzu’s letter out and pointing.

“He’s so _stupid_.” She says, and it’s a thousand times more despairing than she’d meant it to be. Mai _laughs_.

“There’s a reason _you_ have your father’s favor.”

Ty Lee kicks her door in and bounces in with an armload of books.

“What.”

“You kinda…just have to read a lot of them? And their explanations? And then you’ll get it!”

“Proverbs are poetry for men.” Mai explains, and. Well.

That explains _everything_.

X

She summons cold fire.

A week later Ty Lee tumbles into her room pale and shaking and slips a warm, sweaty piece of paper into her hand.

Azula reads it. The paper disintegrates into ash in her fingers. Distantly, she hears crackling.

Ty Lee gets her to a training courtyard, dark and silent save for the training dummies slumped against the far wall.

She moves on instinct. It isn’t the forms that have been drilled into her. This is casual, this is _mastery_. Lightning does not burn her, does not scald her veins and inflame her flesh. This is like – well. Like Mai describes _painting_.

The wall behind the dummies is blackened and crumpling in on itself when she finishes. She is not even out of breath.

She is the heir to the Fire Lord himself. She is a firebender of unparalleled genius. The youngest master of the cold fire in existence. She has been methodically stripped of everything that made her a courtly _lady_ since she first breathed flame.

She has not missed much. She hungers for more, always has, and Mai is a good teacher. Azula knows exactly what etiquette to drop and pick up to make her point across. Her bows are sharp and crisp and always at a perfect angle. She can use a fan, and knows what perfumes say what to whom, what makeup to avoid and what to use to make a _point_. She knows the subtly of court poetry and song, though she does not indulge in that.

But she has never had an official teacher of these things. They are womanly, as much as something can be _gendered_ in the Fire Nation. They are the things passed from mother to daughter in honor of their history, in honor of the women who lived in a less enlightened time. They are the things no woman allows her own to forget, because should that time ever make a resurgence, _they will be ready_.

But she is the Fire Lord’s favored child. His true heir. A Master firebender, tactician, warrior, _princess_. Those are things that matter, pursuits that are strong. What could poison and flattery and silks get her, that a flame and a fist could not? She is not like _Zuzu_ , after all. And she has never had a mother.

And yet her father still sees her _womb_ before her _skill_ where it matters most. She is not to be a lady; until she is.

Her bleeding had begun two months ago. Her father had begun arranging things the moment he found out.

The insult is so great that she cannot breathe.

“Can I burn it out?” She asks numbly. She can hear the distant panic of servants and guards. They do not have much longer before their privacy is shattered.

Ty Lee’s eyes are big and luminous in the dark.

“If you’re feeling ill, my grannie taught me some remedies.” Ty Lee says quietly, carefully.

Azula’s mouth quivers so unsteadily she nearly screams. Ty Lee reaches out and curls their fingers together, heedless of the little blue sparks softly lighting the air around her.

“Some of them might help your – um. Your monthlies. The pain will go away for good.”

Ty Lee breathes it into her ear, lips warm and dry.

She cannot go to Mai for this. Mai will kill her father, _cry at her_ , if she finds out.

“Teach me to brew?” _Teach me poison_.

Ty Lee is no lady of the court. But her family is more entrenched in those arts that show teeth behind a smile. They have had to, with the Fire Lord’s favor a constant shadow looming over them.

“I would be honored.” Ty Lee says quietly, and rests her forehead on Azula’s shoulder.

When the palace staff finally comes pouring out, Ty Lee turns the embrace into an exuberant hug and loudly starts exclaiming _did you see it? Did you see it? Isn’t she great! Look it!_

Her father looks pleased at the damage. Pleased at her initiative, to hold late night training sessions of her own.

Tucked into her bed nearly an hour later, Ty Lee shunted off to her own chambers, Azula stares up at her ceiling.

Azula has never had to save herself before.

She allows herself to miss Zuzu so much it _hurts_ for exactly the time it takes to snuff her candle out.

X

She gets word of the Avatar’s return in a letter that is mostly ink splotches and _panic_ mere hours before her father does.

Mai takes one look at the letter and _scowls_.

“I’m going to the armory.” She says, and Ty Lee blinks at her in confusion. Azula raises an eyebrow.

“You think the Avatar is going to come…straight here?”

“No. I think your father is going to tire of your brother’s incompetence and send a _real_ firebender to do the job.” _And I won’t let you go alone_ remains unsaid, but Azula is so touched that her face screws up in horror before she can help it.

Ty Lee is rubbing her cheek into Azula’s the minute she spots the weakness and cooing something about _aura transfer_ and _gold_.

Azula shudders her way out of the girl’s grip and points towards her desk.

“Well then, Ty Lee can write. _Someone_ needs to tell him he can’t possibly succeed.”

“It’s just your brother’s luck.” Mai mutters, and then stalks off.

When Azula finally collects herself, Ty Lee has two and a half pages of looping swirls and hearts penned out. Azula reads over her shoulder, panics for a moment, and then shakes Ty Lee’s shoulders so hard the girl laughs and spills ink over the corner of a new sheet of paper.

“Too much?” She asks, and Azula lets go and flops backwards onto her bed. Her heart is _racing_.

She already knows what Zuzu needs to do. But even beyond that; he’d said the Avatar was an _airbender_.

She can’t change course like that on Ty Lee.

“No.” She finally says. Because this is something that Ty Lee will take _care_ with and, really, hasn’t she been told a good leader knows when to _delegate?_

Mai returns in time to watch Ty Lee address the letter to _my favorite turtleduck_ and smear lipstick on it in the shape of a mouth. Ty Lee produces a pink, sparkly ribbon.

Mai turns on her heel and does not stop moving until she is face down across Azula’s stomach.

Ty Lee patters off and returns in record time, and a silly little lovesick letter wings its way across the skies to deliver what is, effectively, a deathblow to the Fire Lord.

X

They step up their training, their plotting, their strategizing. They have go bags packed and ready to go. Azula allows one weekend a month for recuperation; every other day they attend their lessons and courtly functions and meet on the rooftops to improve their already perfected skills.

Azula masters poisoning. She moves on to stealth, per Zuzu’s recommendation.

His letters grow infrequent and increasingly convoluted. There is no code in existence that could keep them abreast of his adventures, and there are some things he is so clearly hesitant to even put in ink that his stories do not always make sense.

A sickness takes the youth of the Caldera, what few boys are not yet fighting in the war. Azula tuts disapprovingly at their weakness as they waste away.

An attempt is made to separate her from her girls. Her father doesn’t _dare_ say it to her face; and she gets to experience the full delight of _plausible deniability_ as she ignores weak attempts to send what is _hers_ away.

Mai’s parents help. They have a son, now. What use is their spare heir _now_? Mai looks constipated when she brings it up. Azula understands; she has her own Zuzu now, and sooner or later he will need to be _liberated_ from his fool parents. Her girls deserve a reward for their loyalty, after all. If all Mai asks for is her brother, all the better. Ty Lee has her eyes set on the _Avatar_.

Azula masters stealth. She moves their training nights somewhere even more secure, and Ty Lee begins teaching them chi-blocking. Mai teaches them blades.

Azula teaches her girls death.

X

Zuzu gives up on self-preservation during the raid on the North. The three of them hole up in Mai’s chambers and cling to one another, because they had had to live with Zhao’s pretty little declaration of Zuzu’s death for six _hours_ before a hawk landed on Mai’s windowsill with a waterlogged scrap reading _alive. joining. stay safe._

“It’s time to make our move.”

X

Father tires of Zuko’s incompetence, his _competence_ , and a few well-placed complaints of _boredom_ and _how come Zuzu gets to have all the fun?_ and a missive from some unnamed captain telling them of Zhao’s death and the invasion’s failure puts her right where she wants to be.

Her father does not tell her of Zuko’s treason. He tells her to bring the Avatar back at all costs. She has an image to maintain; she does not mention her brother. She beams, bright and vicious and predatory. Her delight is not feigned.

He makes a spectacle of it. Makes it public.

When she turns to face the court, her eyes are just a touch too wide and soft and her father’s words of _do what your brother cannot_ linger in the air around her. It garners her looks of pity and sympathy and sorrow from the court. The servants look at her and lift their chins in respect.

She hates it.

They leave by nightfall.


	4. Chapter 4

She disguises herself, and links her arms through her girls’, and the three of them slip off their ship and into a seedy little bar on the harbor. Ty Lee is excited by the adventure, but even Mai is happy – she gets to take full advantage of her height and age, after all. She’s the only one among them that passes as an actual _adult_.

They are in the nebulous stretch of land between the Fire Nation proper and the start of the colonies, where the Fire Nation has ruled even before the war but only now with any kind of fervor. They claim a table in the back, and Mai slips off with a predatory grace to her steps, determined to find them some form of alcohol.

Azula lounges back in her seat and lets the tension in her shoulder relax for the first time since she first spat sparks.

She’s never been away from Father like this before. It’s… _something_.

Ty Lee sucks in a sharp breath, and Azula opens her eyes to see Mai striding back across the bar towards them. The look in her eye and the slant to her mouth scream _we need to leave_ , and by the time she reaches them she and Ty Lee are standing and falling in line behind her.

Mai does not lead them back to the ship. Azula’s eyebrows climb so high she almost touches them, to make sure they’re still in their rightful place, as Mai leads them down to the beach.

She doesn’t stop until they are far from anyone who could hear, nothing but the waves and the wind to keep them company. There isn’t even a _rock_ big enough for someone to hide behind, here.

Mai turns to them, and speaks treason.

“He did it.”

“Who?”

“ _Zuko_. He – they were talking. Some old sailors; Zuko must’ve stopped by here at some point.”

Her breath catches in her lungs.

The only kindness she had ever done for her brother was to spread the truth of his banishment from the Caldera itself. But the Caldera was insular, protected. It stood above the rest of the Fire Nation, in no small part due to her father’s influence. She’d never known if the truth had spread past the rumors, or how far it had gotten.

“He was here? Ooh! We’re so good at this tracking thing!” Ty Lee clapped her hands in delight, and even Mai cracked a smile, even if only momentarily. Her eyes were dark and serious, and her hands firm when they grabbed Azula’s. Something like anticipation coiled in her gut.

“You smiled. And you _laughed_. And he nearly killed a man defending you for it here.”

It takes her a moment. She’d have been disgusted with herself, if anyone else had been present.

At the Agni Kai – she’d – _of course_ she’d – it was what Father had expected. What she was bound to deliver.

And Zuzu had –

“What did they say?” She asks, and Mai’s expression turns vicious, victorious.

“If the Fire Lord is willing to brand and banish the Crown Prince for one moment of disrespect, _what do you think he would do to the spare heir if she stepped out of line?”_

“That’s the most insulting thing I’ve ever heard.” She says, and Mai _laughs_.

“They were speaking treason.” Ty Lee says, uncharacteristically subdued. She’s looking back to the harbor, to the bar.

Before she can think about it, Azula reaches out and tugs her closer. Ty Lee turns to her, startled. And then she relaxes, smiles.

“But, then, so are we.”

X

They abandon their military escort in the name of speed. Azula sneers the man who is _officially_ her subordinate and _unofficially_ meant to be her handler into a weak little puddle of filth on the ground, and leaves.

Ty Lee _begs_ her to make their entrance as dramatic as possible, and it’s such a _small_ thing that Azula cannot bring herself to say _no_.

They catch up. They trail the Avatar and his friends. And when they head into town and split up, Ty Lee bounces up to the Avatar and links arms with him. Azula falls in step with her brother, and Mai goes for the little earthbender. The Water Tribe siblings are inconsequential; they mean no harm and the earthbender is the one they need to tell that to.

Zuzu is _bigger_. Tall and slender like Mother had been. She frowns; she only comes up to his shoulders. But she looks up, and all she can see is their father’s parting gift.

She’d known, of course. That the Fire Lord meant to _maim_. Had deprived Zuzu of medical care appropriate for a crown prince. But seeing it in the flesh is…an experience.

“I suppose coming up on your blind side was something of a mistake.” She says, and Zuzu starts.

He turns. His bad eye is filmed over, though given the way it tracks her she suspects he has some vision left. But he looks the same, if sharper, more _angular_ , on his good side.

_“Lala.”_

He says her name like a prayer, and something in her loosens. She reaches out and plucks a scrap of paper from his hands, eyeing it critically.

He’s _grocery shopping_. Provisions, supplies. She rolls her eyes, and takes over.

He doesn’t say a word, just taps her arm when he decides she’s haggled enough.

She makes him carry everything, of course. He’s laden with packages and supplies by the time Ty Lee drags the Avatar over, and the monk looks so _terrified_ beside her grin that Azula has to work _hard_ not to laugh.

“Zuzu! Hi! Oh my _spirits_ it’s so good to see you! How have you been!”

Zuzu shifts his _stuff_ and Azula watches with a kind of incredulity as he carefully folds Ty Lee into a rough approximation of a hug.

Ty Lee looks like Agni himself just came down and declared her queen of the circus.

“We should probably go to your camp before she explodes.” Azula sighs, and, yes. Ty Lee’s begun _vibrating_. Distantly, she realizes that the Avatar has been chi-blocked. Zuzu doesn’t seem concerned, which is – _nice_. She ignores the warmth it brings, and twists around until she makes eye contact with Mai.

Mai, who is expressionless and leaning very visibly on the head of the earthbender, who has her arms folded across her chest as if nothing is wrong.

“Oh and _Mai_ made a friend? This is the _best. Day. Ever!”_

X

Ty Lee stops with the unquenched enthusiasm the moment they get to the Avatar’s camp, tosses the boy to the dirt, and bursts into ugly sobs in Zuzu’s arms. Mai gives her brother a kind of half-hearted sneer she reserves only for the two of them, and sits primly and properly beside their cold fire.

The Avatar’s friends look _spooked_. Azula casts a _third_ glance around their camp, and frowns. Not even at the mountain of _fluff_ huffing at her. Just in _general_.

“Where is Uncle?”

Zuzu shifts uncomfortably on his feet, but doesn’t succeed in dislodging Ty Lee. He hasn’t really looked away from _her_ the whole time. And it’s – nice. She’s studying him with the same kind of hunger, the same intensity.

That doesn’t keep her from picking up on his silence and _smirking_.

“Uncle tried his hand at politics?”

“He wants to make me Fire Lord.” Zuzu bursts out, and he slides into the dirt where he stands, heedless of Ty Lee. She goes with him and cuddles up under his arm. She makes cow eyes at Azula and grins, because she _knows_ and -

Zuzu’s _allies_ look surprised by this.

“…Isn’t that the _point_? You’re the _crown prince_ , Sparky.” The earthbender says, her head tilted. Mai snorts.

“Did you _tell_ Uncle what we are doing?” Azula asks suddenly, and it hits her, even before he shakes his head –

“I wasn’t going to betray us like that. And I…didn’t. Notice. Not until – he’s fine. We left him in the North. He has some. Secret treason thing, he has allies there. And he has the crew.”

“If you were any stupider, he would’ve made out like a _king_.” Azula says faintly, because – _wow_.

“Wait. So. _You four_ are _also_ committing treason? But Zuko already _is_ committing reason? But Iroh is doing _different_ treason? Are you doing _double_ treason?!”

The chi-blocking wore off, she notes, as the Avatar leaps up and – catches himself before flinging himself at Zuko. He eyes Ty Lee warily, and flies across the ground to hide behind the Water Tribe girl. The waterbender.

“Well. Anyway. We’re still engaged.” Mai announces suddenly. Zuzu’s allies all turn to look at her in varying degrees of shock and horror, and Zuzu tilts his head.

“Did we ever…stop?”

“No.”

“Not until Father’s dead.” Azula says, and Zuzu looks at her. And then Mai. And then Ty Lee, who is beaming up at him, and he _lights up_ , and –

No.

“I would love to continue playing catch up, but we are still _frightfully_ close to that backwater little Earth village and we _are_ supposed to be hunting you.”

“Did he –“

“No. No declaration of treason. He just said you were acceptable collateral damage.”

“You’re talking about _Ozai_. Your _father_.” The waterbender bursts out, and the four of them turn to stare at her like –

“Is there another Fire Lord we don’t know of?” She asks dryly, and the girl leaps to her feet.

“He knows how skilled we are. We’ll need something impressive to warrant our… _dallying_.” Mai says quietly. The Water Tribe boy looks at her, and then at Zuzu, and – that is a _thinking_ face.

“How can you be so cavalier about this and expect us to trust you!? He’s your _father_ and you’re talking about _murdering_ him!”

Azula’s eyebrows are _climbing_. This is, judging by the reactions around her, an old argument, but – Zuzu’s _put up with it?_

Oh, turtleduck is too much for him. Maybe a snail-slug. Something without a _spine._

“Our father. Who attempted to murder Zuko and only stopped because our mother agreed to murder our grandfather. Who then _most likely_ murdered our mother, and _most likely_ ordered our cousin murdered. Who then attempted to publicly kill my brother in single combat and _failed,_ and then banished him from the Fire Nation _on penalty of death_. And – frankly. I would think you would be _glad_ we’re here to help your little…rebellion. You want the war to end; it will not so long as Ozai lives.”

“But if he doesn’t have the crown – “

“We have the common people on our side. But this war has been going a hundred years, Aang. Anyone in power right now is there because they _excel_ at profiting off of that kind of death and destruction. Ozai, and his war, ensure they will never go hungry.”

The Avatar doesn’t want to kill, she realizes, and she starts laughing.

“Oh, please. _You_ won’t have to kill him. You’ll have to get in line!”

Mai nods solemnly at this, and Azula’s breath catches in her throat.

“Alright, enough. We’ll trust you, because Zuko does, and we trust him, and you’d already be dead if anyone caught you out here. But if you’re hunting us, we can give Ozai a chase. And…we’ll meet in Ba Sing Se. That’s a big enough target, right?” The Water Tribe boy announces, and he’s on his feet too but mostly to catch his sister’s arm and hold her in place. He even holds her gaze steadily, which is more than she can say for his sister.

“Consider it a challenge, Zula. Can you take the city by yourselves? Bloodlessly?” Zuzu sounds _amused_ , and –

Mai looks _excited_. Ty Lee is clinging even tighter to her brother.

“ _Bloodlessly_. You’re afraid hearing about it will give Uncle a heart attack.”

She stands, and Ty Lee kisses Zuzu’s scar as loudly and obnoxiously as she possibly can before joining her. Mai pats the earthbender’s shoulder, and joins them.

“Please. Make the chase _somewhat_ of a challenge.” She instructs.

“Gotta make it look real. So. _Make it real_.” The Water Tribe warrior fires back. She studies him a moment longer, and _smiles_.

It’s so _sweet_ that Zuzu’s found a friend; a real friend, a boy his own age, that _isn’t_ a complete idiot.

“That can be arranged.” She says, and she strikes.

X

“How do we look?” Azula asks, and Ty Lee spins in a circle, hands waving excitedly above her head. Zuzu brightens, and doesn’t even look away from them when he reaches over and starts pounding on the choking Water Tribe boy’s back.

The Avatar picks himself up off the floor, one hand held to his chest. It had been immature and petty, but his fright made their entrance worth it.

“Aren’t we being spied on?”

“The Dai Li are ours.” She says dismissively, and sits down at their table. Mai takes her spot at her side and pours her a cup of broth with the kind of grace only a Fire Nation lady could.

“How long have you been here?”

“At _least_ a week.” Mai mutters, and the waterbender gapes. Zuzu looks impressed.

“How’d you even _get_ that armor?”

“Oh! It was _great!_ Suki says hi, by the way! She’s _fantastic!_ Don’t worry, we left her alive! And Azula even paid her for the uniforms!”

“No, we paid her for the makeup lessons.” Azula corrects. Mai scowls at the table.

“I couldn’t get the liner right.”

The Water Tribe boy starts choking again.

“Did Uncle ever teach you lightning?” She asks, and turns to her brother fully. He pauses.

“…He taught me to redirect it.”

She blinks in surprise, and is halfway to her feet before she remembers she’s in the heart of the Earth Kingdom and even her shiny new Dai Li won’t be able to help her if she bends so visibly. Zuzu’s face is doing that soft, sappy thing it does, so she sneers at him and turns to his allies.

They are owed an explanation, and she does not trust Zuzu to be thorough enough.

“Have you spent any time in the Fire Nation yet?”

“Not really. Not – not any significant amount of time.”

“The colonies don’t talk about it. It’s treason there.” Zuzu chimes in. Azula drums her fingers on the table, and takes a sip of her broth.

“Well. The long and short of it is that Zuzu decided to start a civil war a few years ago to make me Fire Lord.”

In the ensuing silence, Ty Lee reaches over and pulls a pin out of Mai’s hair just to drop it on the floor and giggle hysterically at the audible _tink_. Mai swats her, but Ty Lee is unrepentant.

“This would be about the time your father set him on fire?” The Water Tribe boy asks, and.

“What’s your name?”

“…Sokka? Did you not know that?”

“I didn’t _care_.”

“No, it was before that.” Zuzu interrupts, and starts clearing off the table. Sokka whines when Zuko grabs a bowl of noodles, and Zuzu puts it back without so much as blinking. Azula raises an eyebrow at him and takes a pointed drink of her cup.

“Wait – there’s no civil war going on, what are you talking about?” The monk asks. The earthbender’s grinning ear-to-ear at his side. The general approval radiating from the child is – pleasing.

She sets her cup down and narrows her eyes, debating.

“Azula has a hard time with emotions.” Mai deadpans, and. Well, that’s a starting point.

“Ozai wanted the perfect heir. The perfect _weapon_. He got it. There was no time for the…common rabble in that.”

The Avatar and all his friends swing as one to stare at Zuzu.

“I…made sure people got it. And after the Agni Kai…it was a lot easier for them to understand.”

“To understand what your father would do to you.” The waterbender says softly, fists clenched in her lap, and Azula inclines her head.

“If the Fire Lord was willing to try and kill his own heir in _public_ for the crime of defending his people, what would he do to the _spare heir?_ ” She says, and relishes the _irony_ in that phrase.

“She’s done a good job. She protects the servants now.” Mai says, and Zuzu brightens again, beams at her with such pride that it turns her stomach. She puts a hand to his face and shoves him off when she realizes he’s _also_ gravitating closer and closer. It’s kind of delightful, the looks of unease on his friend’s faces. The earthbender’s grin is absolutely _feral_.

“So just to be clear. Zuko doesn’t want the throne. You do.” Sokka says flatly, and her girls nod in sync. He taps his fingers on the table, shoves a mountain of noodles in his mouth, and gives them a sharp nod.

“So Uncle was trying to put _Zuko_ on the throne. Why didn’t you ever tell him?”

“He hates me.” Azula says simply, and even though Zuzu squints at her, he doesn’t _deny_ it.

“Why…?”

“He was friends with Mother. She…didn’t like Azula. Because Father did.” Zuzu says, and the waterbender throws her hands in the air. Azula would have been surprised at Zuzu speaking out against his mother, if it hadn’t been for – for that slap, the echo of _monster_ in the palace halls and murder in his eyes.

It makes her feel _warm_ now, and it takes effort not to preen under it.

“I swear to _La_ when this is over I’m going to fucking _educate_ your entire fucking _nation_ on what _family_ means!”

Sokka catches her eye, swallows, and rolls his shoulders.

“We’d have put him out on the ice.”

She tilts her head. _There’s_ a thought.

“We don’t have ice. We _do_ have volcanos.”

Ty Lee scrambles to her feet, handing Mai back her pin.

“Time’s almost up!” She chirps, and Azula sighs. Sokka shoots her a questioning look.

“We’ll be back, same time tomorrow, and you can tell us your plan. We’ll improve it then.”

“You’re still in disguise?” Zuzu asks, frowning. Mai shrugs.

“The King’s bear like’s Ty Lee.”

“Wait—if the Dai Lee are yours, is Appa---?” The Avatar cuts himself off, mostly, Azula thinks, because he’s reflexively grabbed onto the edge of Ty Lee’s robes. He catches himself and flings himself backwards, hiding behind the waterbender before Ty Lee can grab him.

“Zuzu’s warned me about you. The animal is safe and happy, and will remain so in an undisclosed location, until it’s time for you to escape the city.”

She can _feel_ the emotion rising at her words, the anger and hurt and frustration and guilt. These are not her friends. They are Zuzu’s.

She feels no remorse for abandoning him to the ensuing tantrum.

X

_dragon child_ , it calls her.

_worm,_ it calls her father.

X

To her delight, Sokka has a plan that _doesn’t_ need to be scrapped in its entirety. His handwriting is illegible and she spends a good hour listening to him explain his plot down to every detail, and then another ten minutes _contemplating_.

“Well?” She asks, and Mai’s mouth quirks upwards.

It’s like a puzzle, all sharp edges and holes. Their own plot must fit _seamlessly_ , or this will all be for naught.

“We need to lower your father’s guard, first. There are plans in place for the Day of Black Sun, have been for – years.”

The Avatar’s friends tense.

“What do you mean?”

“I _told_ you. It’s common knowledge.”

“You didn’t believe him?” She asks, raising an eyebrow. Sokka lets out an explosive sigh, and slumps forward onto the table between them.

“More like. I was _hoping_ he was exaggerating.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Thanks.”

She taps her nails on the table absently, and then tilts her head.

“We take Ba Sing Se. Cut off your escape routes, so to speak. You flee. We attack during your retreat.”

“Yeah. So we get out of the city. But that’s not – “ Ty Lee doesn’t even glance at the Avatar when she kicks him. Azula flashes her a bright smile, and folds her hands in front of her.

“Zuzu, how confident are you in that – redirecting lightning trick?”

Her brother chews on the inside of his cheek for a moment before shrugging.

“It’s – redirecting chi. Not…not really bending. It should be fine.”

And Azula believes him.

She’s always had the firepower, the sheer _strength_ of will. But Zuzu, with his weaker flames, has had to learn so much more control, _finesse_ , than she has ever been afforded. He manipulates his chi on a level she cannot fathom, to stretch his power that much farther. She’ll rectify that, once her father is dead. But for now – if he says he can, he can.

“I’ll strike the Avatar down. You’ll jump in front of him, redirect the lightning…somewhere specific. Close. We can’t have anyone noticing the bolt flying off into the sky.”

“I can help with that.” The earthbender says confidently, and she slaps a bracelet off her arm and onto the table.

And then she _bends_ it.

“That is _so cool!”_ Ty Lee squeals, and. Yes. It is.

“You’ve heard of lightning rods, right?” The earthbender asks.

“…What was your name?” Azula asks.

She gets a smile full of teeth.

“Toph Beifong.” Azula appraises her again, shifts a few calculations. This might actually work _well_ , she thinks, and returns the girl’s grin.

“So we…fake their deaths?” Sokka interrupts. The irritation is temporary, but no less intense. She takes a moment to breathe, and Mai steps in. Seamless, perfect.

“You can scream, can’t you?”

“We’ll still need _proof_ , even if they get away with the bodies.” Ty Lee chimes in, and Azula turns an expectant gaze to her brother.

Zuzu gets up and combs through what she assumes are his bags, before returning with a familiar blue mask in hand.

“I’ll drop this.”

She redoes her calculations.

Revealing Zuko as the Blue Spirit is a risk, but…the people will adore it. Love him more for it more than they already do, with a fervor enough to ignite their blood. She won’t even need to spread the rumor; the court will do it for her no matter how much flame and ash the Fire Lord throws at it.

“…This might actually go better than expected.” Mai mutters. Azula’s breath is caught in her throat, somewhere between hope and unease and this is all coming together so _suspiciously_ well.

“Zuzu?”

She hates herself for asking. He looks at her, unblinking.

“It calls Father _worm_. What does it call you?”

He’s – surprised. Awed. Delighted. And then he gives her a shy, secret smile, and some knot inside of her loosens, unravels, falls away.

“You already know.”

She closes her eyes, and breathes out sparks. Opens them to a table full of children and treason, and lifts her head as a proper soon-to-be Fire Lord should.

“Then let us begin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> every chp getting l o n g e r


	5. Chapter 5

She returns to the court with victories under her belt and her brother’s mask in her hands. She lays it at her father’s feet and kneels, and at his command regales the court with all the pretty lies she’s spun. An Avatar, dead or critically injured. A traitor crown prince, slain. An impenetrable city, taken. A princess, victorious.

And her heart stutters to a halt when the Fire Lord turns his gaze to her girls, and asks Mai in a voice like silk and embers, if she yet grieves her betrothed.

Mai drops into a beautiful, elegant bow.

“Any love I bore the prince withered at his betrayal to the Crown, your Majesty.”

Her voice is flat, face expressionless. But her knuckles are white around her skirts, and that is all the tell Mai has ever given in the court. Her father’s eyes rest on her hands, not her face, and he smiles.

They’ve a week. A week until the Day of Black Sun, a week until she burns her bare _fucking hand_ through her father’s throat, a week to pray that Mai’s name does not end up on another list on the Fire Lord’s desk, a week to _beg_ Agni himself that Mai’s prior engagement may yet offer her some brief reprieve, some whisper of protection.

She keeps her mask firmly in place, and rages and rages and _rages_ inside.

He orders a feast.

Her tongue is flame. It all turns to ash in her throat.

X

Azula wakes to Mai, white-faced and furious and hurt and in absolute disbelief at the foot of her bed. Ty Lee is silent behind her, eyes fixed firmly on the floor.

 _“What did you do?”_ She gasps, and Azula would – laugh, would toss her fingers in dismissal, would sneer but –

She swings herself out of bed, and her bare feet have hardly landed on her rug when Mai is touching her, one hand tight on her wrist and the other – the other, hovering over her stomach.

“I thought it would help. Offering.” Ty Lee’s voice is so small and broken, and –

Azula takes a breath and holds it until the heat of it sears her lungs. She touches the wrist of the hand wrapped around her own, gentle.

“When has _anyone_ ever looked at me and seen a _woman_?” She asks lowly, and then Mai is seizing her face in her hands, and she’s – crying, Azula realizes. It twists something in her, something sharp and angry and _uncomfortable_.

 _“I have_. We – we _both_ have, Azula! You could have – “

She does not know what to do, and so she moves on instinct, and presses her cheek against Mai’s palm.

“I have given everything to him. I have let him tear me apart and cobble me back together. I have given him my mother, I have given him my brother, I have given him _both of you_. And that is _not enough_ , not for him.”

There’s a cool hand, tangling against her own. Mai jerks, turns her heartbreak on Ty Lee and lets one hand fall from Azula’s face.

“What she is weighs less in his eyes than her womb. Less than _yours_.” Ty Lee says quietly, and Mai’s expression, already so broken and wild, crumbles further.

Azula does not know what to do. She’d known Mai would be angry, known she would be upset. But the – she cannot understand it, this.

“Do you think I care _whose_ womb we’ll use?” She asks, and the thought has rage, indignation rising up her spine like a flame – and her girls are looking at her, anguish and shock and –

Mai drags her close with claws and steel, draws her in and holds her so fiercely that Azula cannot breathe. Ty Lee’s touch is gentle, soft and cool against her back, and it is such a reversal, such a change –

She realizes that she’s never – _acknowledged_ it. Not aloud. Not _verbally_.

Mai is sobbing into her hair, and Ty Lee’s breath is shuddery and unsteady against her spine.

Azula grits her teeth, and endures.

X

The war council is an absolute mess, and Azula watches with a kind of horrified fascination as they struggle to fit her victory over Ba Sing Se into what…what she cannot even generously call _plans_.

There is only so much of the world left to conquer, so much left to destroy, so much left to wage _war_ on. She’s ruined their calculations, and they cannot be angry with her for it, not when she’s brought such a valiant victory to the Fire Nation or suffered a betrayal of one so close and dear in doing so.

But so has her father, she realizes, and she stares down at a sheet of dates.

 _Sozin’s comet_ , she thinks, and thrills at the thought of burning her enemies with flames so bright they rival the sun.

It’s a pity, she thinks, that her father will never taste that power. His supporters likely will; she wonders how long she can prolong the civil war, just to get a chance to lay waste on those who turn on their rightful rulers with their _own element_.

Ty Lee is perfectly poised and silent at her shoulder, but she can see the girl’s fingers twitching in excitement where they knot in her silks.

Zuko had been the first to tell her the war was unsustainable. She’s never seen it so cleanly before; her victory a close end and Sozin’s comet yet another.

The generals are furious, but they dare not speak out. They’ve illusions of loyalty to maintain, and…the war won’t end just because it _ends_. There will be prison camps to run and guard and people to subjugate, to enslave and train in the ways of their new masters. There will be carnage enough for all, even after the last flag has fallen.

Azula does not think the thought pretty; the only _pretty_ thing about carnage is when she stands unchallenged above the corpses of her enemies, and that would never happen in the world her father seeks to build.

Eventually a cursory glance is given to the plans for the Day of Black Sun. Her father is secure in his delusions of grandeur and greatness. He has prepared for, but does not expect, a serious threat to his safety in his weakest hour. Azula pays attention, but even that is not what she is there for.

Ty Lee is studious at her side, memorizing faces and auras and body languages. She does not know these men and women – and oh, how few women there are, how had she not _noticed?_ – by name. But the seating arrangements are so very particular and steeped so deeply in politics that all she will have to do is tell Mai where her target sat, and Mai will pen two lovely lists of names in her best calligraphy for the three of them to go over.

Those who rage at her father, who keep their mouths still and quiet. And those who rage _with_ her father, who would sooner turn on her than accept her father’s defeat.

It’s not quite cleaning house. Something close to it, perhaps, a preparation. But it is _satisfying_ in a way that settles into her very _bones_.

And so Azula waits, and smiles, and listens, while her girls do the work.

X

Four days from the Day of Black Sun and Ty Lee’s family floods the halls of the palace. Ty Lee’s smile is rigid on her lips, as unyielding as Azula’s own, but she allows her girl’s family to greet their youngest in the relative privacy of her personal courtyard.

Mai sits, eyes dark and darting, at her side.

 _Officially_ , her father had said at dinner last night, they are there as extra security on the Day of Black Sun. That Ozai has drawn every single one of the Fire Nation’s chi-blockers to guard his own home is not something that will reflect well on him no matter _how_ the battle turns out, and while Mai fears they have been discovered, Azula fears _more_.

Ty Lee, after all, helped in the capture and killing of the Avatar himself. Her aide brought down the traitor of a crown prince, Ursa’s son through-and-through. She is _valuable_ now. Ty Lee is no longer invisible. No longer _safe_.

Azula allows herself to acknowledge that she has made a mistake. She’s killed most of the noble boys their age. It won’t matter, once she has the crown – very few of the _current_ noble families will _remain_ noble when she’s done with them – but in her father’s court that means _everything_.

The Fire Nation is at war, after all. It has need of strong children, of _many_ strong children. Ty Lee is too low a station to _marry_ a nobleman, of course – but all the better, for the older men who have spent their lives leering and touching the servants of the palace are already married. And all those old men may still father children, while their wives may not.

The Fire Lord has invited her family as a gesture of good will. Negotiations, he will call it. But there will be no choice, not for any of them. Azula cares nothing for any of Ty Lee’s clan, would expect nothing less than their total and utter disregard for their youngest’s safety. But it is still an _insult_.

So; she watches them with death in her eyes and rage on her tongue until their smiles grow strained and fragile, until even their cheer dampens, until Ty Lee risks a brush of a hand over her own and speaks.

“He was an airbender.”

Her family has settled now as close to the blanket Azula and Mai rest on as they dare. Ty Lee flings herself down in front of the two of them with no regard for propriety, but her family sits cross-legged or kneeling. She seems them breathe in as one, sharp and sudden, and hates them so deeply her marrow boils in her bones.

They are _community_. And from that first gap-toothed grin, that first _can I be your friend?_ they have ostracized and ignored the greatest among them.

She will not kill them, because that is her father’s threat, because they love Ty Lee enough to stay docile for the sake of the breath in her lungs, because Ty Lee returns that fervor. But she doesn’t _like_ them.

“He was a _baby_.” Ty Lee whispers, and she curls in on herself while her family go rigid.

This, Azula realizes, is a game of Ty Lee’s making. She lets out a breath only a touch warmer than it should be, and inclines her head when Ty Lee meets her gaze, searching.

“He had the markings of an airbending master, but he was a child. Younger than I. I do not know if the proclamation of his skill was earned or given due to his…standing.” Azula says.

“They didn’t teach him anything. I think – they’re all dead and gone now, but it makes it _worse_. He didn’t know _anything_. He couldn’t answer my call and his aura was still _orange_ and he didn’t even know what chi-blocking _is_.”

She marks the ripples of shock and fear and anger and despair with interest, as they spread through Ty Lee’s brethren. Ty Lee has explained it in detail to them, of course. Even the weakest airbender could bend _chi_ , shift the breath and wind and flow of it like the currents of air they twisted. It had been the perfect offensive force for a nation of peaceful monks; temporary, debilitating, and frightening. By all rights the Avatar should have known _of_ it, if not how to do it himself. He should have recognized his people’s prayers peppered into Ty Lee’s speech and felt how _light_ she was on ground that could not hold her.

She’d made sure to tell them after Ba Sing Se, after they were already on their way back to the Fire Nation. She didn’t want to risk Azula burning the brat.

Ty Lee pushes herself up on her elbows, and looks at her family earnest and solemn. It’s a frightening look on her, and Azula bites hard on her tongue to prevent some sappy little smile from touching her own lips. To her right, Mai does the same.

“We owe him a duty. To teach him his own ways.” Ty Lee say softly, inaudibly. The wind catches her words, brings it to the ears of those she wishes to hear it.

“You _owed_.” Azula drawls, and Ty Lee giggles, lays back and rolls herself closer to their knees.

“Right! _Owed_.”

Azula looks up, and meets the stunned gaze of one of Mai’s grandparents head on. She tilts her head and smiles.

“Can’t blame a girl for trying, I suppose.”

X

She does not know where Zuzu is. Where Sokka or Toph or the Avatar or that irritating waterbender are. She does not know if the invasion force is ready, if they will arrive on time.

The night before the Day of Black Sun, Azula stands on the roof of the palace and looks down at her domain. Tomorrow, it will burn and blacken and finally the whole of the world will see her father’s rot purged from the heart of her nation. Tomorrow she will separate her father’s head from his shoulders and toss the whole lot into the ocean – an ignoble death for an ignoble man.

She cannot bring herself to feel for all the little _bugs_ crawling around the Caldera, the untold thousands in the midst of an active warzone, the soldiers and the civilians alike. The best she can offer them is Zuzu’s adoration, his love strong and steady at her side. Her girls _understand_ it, but they do not _feel_ it, not like Zuzu does. It’s him or nothing, and he is all she has to offer.

They look at her now. When she goes out to the street markets and buys snacks and knives and silks for her girls, when she acts every bit the pompous spoiled princess she should have had the chance to be, their gazes do not stay rooted in the dirt and dust at their feet. They lower the price on things she buys not out of _fear_ anymore. They whisper _apologies_ when they think the guards tailing her will not hear.

She loathes it, hates it. But, she supposes, soon enough they will know the truth of the matter. If they do not fear her then, they are irreparably _broken_ , and even she cannot fix _that_.

Azula turns on her heel and puts her back to the city. She slips across the rooftop and down through the palace until she comes to the ancestral temple, and holds her head high when she steps in.

It’s not _dirty_ , but the temple’s disuse is obvious. She hasn’t been here since her brother’s Angi Kai; hasn’t seen the need to pray since. She doesn’t think she sees the need _now_.

She drums her fingers on the altar idly, and stares up at the ugly little statue her grandfather had had installed. Agni is depicted in shocking similarity to the royal line; whether Azulon meant to emulate himself or his father, Azula does not know.

There is ash, tucked into the creases of the statue. She’d burned Zuzu’s prayer shawl here, after the Agni Kai.

“You don’t get the Caldera.” She says firmly, and does not let herself look away from the fire-bright chips of ruby inlaid in the statue’s eye sockets.

Agni would burn the entire nation to dust if it could, its rage was so great. It liked her, adored her brother. But the rest were – well. _Nothing_.

She thinks that is why it favors Zuzu so. She is too similar.

“You just get the worm.” She whispers, and leaves.

X

“I would do this for you.” She says. Ty Lee stills, goes motionless. Mai looks up, hands still poised with pins above her head.

“I am doing this for myself. For Zuzu. But I would do this for you, if things were different.”

She does not let herself continue dressing, does not let herself look away. She could, she _wants_ , to make nothing of her words. To keep them light and casual. But should anything happen today, she does not think it will be her bearing the cost.

The thought is intolerable.

“We know.” Mai whispers, gentle and soft and knowing. Azula breathes out flame, and nods. Picks up a dagger and slides it into her boot.

“So long as we are clear.”

X

The Day of the Black Sun, Azula stands at her father’s side and does not let her skin crawl when he sets his hand on her shoulder. He shouts and bellows at the people assembled before him, raises his curtain of fire high enough to scorch the ceilings. He is an effective speaker, she will admit. But he is a coward at heart, and he leaves her to guard the throne room as a _distraction_ while he tucks himself away into his bunker.

He tells her he expects success, whether the worst should come to pass or not. A _test_ , he implies, for business as usual will be conducted that day.

Simply through _her_.

She watches the guards file out after him impassively, and then turns her gaze to the first petitioner.

“Begin.”

X

Mai glides into the throne room with her hands tucked daintily into her sleeves, her hair pulled back into a no-nonsense bun and her makeup flawless. Her silks are elegant and lethal, their folds designed to harbor easy movement and death. The scent of burning flesh and the screams of the dying follow her in, but her expression remains serene and she does not hurry.

The petitioner at Azula’s feet stops his chatter, and scrambles to his feet. Mai ignores him. She has eyes only for Azula, and that – means something.

“Your brother’s here.” She says blandly, dryly, and Azula can’t help the smile quirking the corners of her mouth up.

“He’s late.” She declares, and sweeps up off of her father’s throne. Those petitioners and servants left in the room look at her, fright and shock in varying degrees painted on their faces. And – victory, in some.

“You may wish to flee now.” She hums, and though most scramble for the nearest exit, more than she expects stop to give her a full, low bow before leaving.

“Ty Lee is finding his…friends.” Mai says, and holds out an arm. Azula _knows_ her grin is feral now, but so are Mai’s eyes, and she takes the offered arm with a bow.

“I suppose she was right – about the theatrics.”

“It is satisfying.” Mai sighs, and the two head towards the rendezvous point in companionable silence.

Azula summons a ball of flame to her hand, and watches in fascination as she _feels_ the fire weaken, as it grows harder and harder and _harder_ to maintain. The eclipse isn’t even _here_ yet, and she can feel it.

The waterbender and Toph are waiting for them when they arrive, Toph all but vibrating with bloodlust and excitement and the waterbender splattered with blood.

“So who gets dibs on the Fire Lord?” Toph asks, her words rushed and heated. The waterbender squawks in outrage at the question, but before anyone can reply – and _oh_ are their replies to be made – Zuzu is at her side. He dares to touch her then, a feather-light hand to her hip and the barest press of his lips to her temple.

He knows, she realizes, how harrowing the past week had been. Without his specter there to keep their father busy…

Ty Lee, she notes, is clinging steadfastly to Zuzu’s other side. Sokka and the Avatar are just behind them.

“I was told it would be highly offensive to suggest what we are about to do is an assassination.” Sokka says breathlessly.

“Correct.”

“So – treason squad, _let’s go!”_

Ty Lee catches his arm, and points in the right direction. He doesn’t even blink before charging down the right hallway. The rest of them watch for a minute.

“You missed your turn!” Azula shouts, and without losing momentum, Sokka rings the hallway and runs back to them.

“Please lead.”

“I thought you’d never ask.”

X

“I’ve brought you a present, Father!” She calls, and Ozai looks up with a cruel little smirk on his face and she is absolutely _delighted_ by the way it freezes and falls when her allies fan out behind her.

Eight of them. Sixty seconds without firebending. His flame goes out. Zuzu’s flame goes out. Precisely two heartbeats later, her own blue flame flares orange and fizzles out.

 _“Attack!”_ Ozai roars, and flings an arm out to the chi-blockers lining his crypt. They are looking at Ty Lee, so very serious and solemn and proud and _mature_. Looking at the Avatar, small and uncertain and so very _young_ at her side. They do not move.

Toph stomps her heel into the dirt and gives it a little twist. It is not earth that seizes her father, but metal. The better to hold him with; the better to _hurt_ him with.

“Surrender.” The Avatar calls out, and her father spits poison and vitriol. He freezes for just the barest second, when Zuzu steps up behind her shoulder. Then looks to her, and she cannot help the way her blood freezes in her veins or she lurches onto her heels, the way her shoulders bump against her brother’s chest.

His fingers pluck at her sleeves, pull the fabric back enough to bare her upper arms and the scars there.

He would hold her, she knows, in that moment. Gather her in his arms and grieve, ignore his chance at revenge and justice and _right_.

“I thought more of you, Azula.” Her father says.

And it is not that her words do not sting. That they do not hurt, that they do not tear, that they do not leave her shaking and weak-kneed and afraid. Her brother is at her back and his allies are at her sides and her girls stand by her – but they do not _erase_ her father’s brands.

“I gave you _everything_.” She says instead. Her father’s mouth twists into a sneer, and he lifts his chin higher, the better to glare down the slope of his nose at her with.

“She _poisoned her womb_ because of you.” Mai’s voice strikes like a blade, sixteen years of rage and hurt and pain and fear and the kind of bone-shattering devotion that would kill a lesser soul lending her voice authority and power beyond any Azula has ever heard. Zuzu goes rigid, but really – it’s just another scar.

“She gave up her brother, her mother, her _heart_ for you.”

Mai is advancing on the Fire Lord with each word out of her mouth. Azula is enraptured by the sight, cannot look away despite herself, despite the crawling feeling of eyes on her skin and she cannot _fathom_ how they can stand to _not_ watch.

She sees it before it happens, the twitch of Mai’s hand.

The silver that spouts from her father’s throat.

“Release him.” She says, and she hears Toph’s flesh smack rock as the metal boils away like water. Her father’s hands fly to his throat.

“You don’t _deserve_ to be taken down by the Avatar. By a _bender_.”

Mai has struck – poorly. Off-center.

The better to make him suffer with.

 _A bender_ , she’d said. Azula tears her gaze away but Ty Lee is already looking at her, a soft little smile on her lips.

They’d _plotted_ without her, she realizes, and she cannot bring herself to be angry at it.

And then the flames return, and she breathes in life. Her father’s gurgling and thrashing turn more coordinated, more frenzied. He jerks a poorly coordinated arm up towards Mai, and the girl does not so much as blink.

Azula pulls the flames away with a command like steel, and they roar across the room towards her instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i promise this isn't the end  
> i did a Smart and waited until I had like, most of this written and rewritten like four times before I decided to publish it. I am feeling pretty damn accomplished bc of that, ngl.  
> Also, Mai was the total endgoal of this. From the first draft. Speaking of which. First draft had her stabbing Ozai and then looking at Aang and going "oops my hand slipped" b4 walking off. so.  
> PSA: Yo my american bros and non-bros out there. fucking vote. if you are capable and able and don't, your inaction will cost lives. If you didn't vote and were capable and able in 2016, it already has.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> important note at end

Princess Yue of the Norther Water Tribes doesn’t beam so much as _glow_ at Zuzu, and Azula would’ve killed her right then and there if she hadn’t turned, spotted Azula, and then _glowed her way over_ and called her _sister_.

Zuzu’s panicked letters make a lot more sense in a very short amount of time.

“I _have_ a sister _.”_ He says despairingly, and he’s worried she’s upset and it’s sweet enough to make her roll her eyes and flip a non-existent lock of hair over her shoulder rather than smile.

“ _I_ don’t.”

Yue is water, ice and moonlight spun into mortal flesh. She gravitates towards Azula and Zuzu the moment she enters the courtyard, caught in a pull Azula can feel hammering behind her breastbone. Zuzu looks vaguely ill, but he has always been so much weaker that Azula is not surprised in the least.

Yue’s people are disgraceful. The Northern Princess smiles knowingly and declares it a _work in progress_ , and judging by the choking _rage_ emanating from the men who had accompanied her, Azula figures there is treason waiting to be committed there.

She smiles, all teeth and fang, and offers her sister an arm. Yue’s touch is frigid and gentle, and Azula can hear _dragon child, moonling_ whispered between each and every heartbeat. Zuzu breathes out through his nose and murmurs an appropriate excuse before vanishing.

“I believe I can offer some assistance. Sokka told me about what happened.” Yue says gently, and Azula scoffs at the offer. It’s – well.

Her hair is shorn close to her scalp, her long tresses naught more than ash in her father’s crypt now. It hadn’t all gone up in flame, and some vain little piece of herself had wept in relief. That she doesn’t look like a _monk_ is frankly all the mercy Azula needs and it curdles in her stomach when she lets herself think on it.

And _anyway_. She thinks she likes it. Prefers the stares it gets her to her _old_ hair. Short hair has traditionally been a sign of dishonor and disgrace; and it is _delightful_ to watch those stupid little nobles try and play her like her father and _not_ comment on it.

“I meant the burns, but I see you are made of firmer – hmm. I do not know what you would say. Ice? Earth?”

“Stuff, typically. An Earth Kingdom phrase.”

Yue giggles, and sheds her heavy outer cloaks. A servant gathers them from her arms and bows to the two of them before retreating. Azula puts a hand on her hip, and watches. No such servant approaches Yue’s men. Most of the staff remains the same, and they are _quite_ adept at picking out her moods and wishes without needing instruction. She thinks she’ll keep them.

“We’ll make your men regret their disrespect, while they’re here. You would know best – will they bend, or will they break?” She asks, and Yue’s smile widens. It is honest and genuine and bright, and the hint of still dark waters there makes Azula shiver.

She thinks she will enjoy having a sister.

X

She holds herself still through sheer force of will, and lets out a noisy breath through her nose. The waterbender shoots her a sympathetic look and resumes her inspection.

The water is warm. Heated water works best with firebenders, apparently, but the touch of water on her stomach is as uncomfortable as the eyes and she wishes it were ice-cold instead. At least the chill would distract her.

“You did a _really_ good job.” The waterbender finally says, and the rest of the room goes rigid and the approval there. Azula considers the girl, and then reconsiders.

“Your name was Katara?”

“ _Is_ Katara.” The girl corrects, and bends her glob of water back into the basin at her side.

“Can I ask what you used? We have something similar in the South Pole, but you must take it often and regularly – and if you stop, you can still conceive. It just makes it…very dangerous. Whatever you did is permanent, as best I can tell.”

She levers herself up, ignores the stretch and burn and flare of agony from her shoulders and chest as she does.

“Ty Lee taught me to brew.” She says breathlessly, and there are careful hands at her back helping her sit up properly.

“How are you so _unbothered_ by this?!” Sokka’s voice is sharp and angry. And, interestingly, directed at his sister. Katara looks up at him, expression entirely flat. If he’d decided his sister would be a weaker link, a fight he was more likely to survive, Azula pities the boy.

“What do you thin Gran Gran taught me to do if the Fire Nation ever came back?” She snaps, and Azula hums consideringly.

She’s – glad. That the Southern Tribe, at least, understands _ruthlessness_. It makes dealing with them easier than their sister tribe, than the Earth Kingdom. If they didn’t spurn Agni in favor of their ocean, they would be right at home in the islands and volcanoes of the Fire Nation.

There is precious little that comes _easy_ to ruling a nation, she suspects. She’ll take what comforts she can, no matter how strange, no matter how small.

Sokka pales, but ceases his arguments. Zuzu takes a shuddering breath behind him, and presses his face into his hands. They are so pitifully _dramatic_ that she sneers.

“Zuzu, if you start crying again, I’ll set fire to your pond.”

“I’ll help you, Katara! Azula’s better at brewing than me, but I can teach you about all the ingredients!” Ty Lee voice is bright and shaky and unbelievably gentle. She lets go of Azula slowly, reluctantly, and Katara shoots the rest of them a poisonous look before nodding and leaving with her.

Her two allies gone, Azula steels herself for yet another fight.

“I’m sorry.” Her brother says.

“Don’t – _stop_. It’s – it was a terrible thing, but it’s done and over with. She made this choice, and you’re disrespecting it.” Mai’s voice is sharp and wavering, as unsteady as Ty Lee’s had been. Azula cranes her head back as much as she dares, just to catch the corner of Mai’s jaw in her vision. Mai’s teeth are clenched, but – it shouldn’t, Azula thinks, surprise her so much that Mai is standing beside her in this.

They have always come together in the face of outsiders, after all.

“You seem unbothered. That’s – I’m not – I’m angry it came to it, is all.” Zuzu speaks slowly and carefully, desperate and _pleading_. He knows he is overstepping; knows he _has_ overstepped. It’s reassuring that he is still capable of recognizing that. But – she supposes she will need to get used to it. There is no one left to punish him for his care, after all, and he is living proof that Azula is spiteful enough to toss _all_ her father’s rules off the same cliff she’d tossed his body from.

Azula takes a deep breath and stands. Mai presses a warm, soft cloth to her bare shoulder and begins mopping up the blood and – _other_ – fluids that begin to trickle from her burns.

“This is the last I’ll hear of the matter from those with whom it has no bearing.” She says firmly. Zuzu looks up at her, and nods. Her gaze moves to Sokka, and she finds the boy ready to start _yelling_ again.

“You’re a _boy_. Both of you. You will never and have never had to understand what that means, even here when it _should_ be a baseless distinction. If my father was going to have me raped, you _Agni-damned best believe I was going to deny him the children he sought from it._ ”

If she couldn’t have them – _no one could_. The injustice of it still boils her blood, even now, years later – but Azula has no concern over her fertility or lack thereof. Mai understands that, as little as she likes it. Sokka and Zuzu never will, but neither of them meets her gaze and that is _enough_.

Her father had never been _purposeless_ in his cruelty, and she thinks she may be the only soul who has ever known that.

She realizes she’s been clenching her muscles; her burns are weeping, crackling with pain. She forces herself to relax, and to breathe.

“When Katara has the strength, I am ready for another round.” She says, and Sokka nods before fleeing past her.

Slowly, Mai helps her lay back down. She shouldn’t have gotten up in the first place; she’s likely undone all of Katara’s hard work. She won’t admit it, but she regrets it. She should save her strength for the fights yet to come, against those whom holding still and acknowledging the pain will be weakness.

“…You called it my pond.” Zuzu finally whispers, and Azula risks turning her head to look at him. He has a strange look in his eyes, something like amusement in the curl of his lips.

“Have you been there since my banishment?” He asks.

“What for?” She asks, and he _softens_ , as if she hadn’t just insulted what she _knows_ is his favorite place in the palace.

“I was – replanting it. For your birthday.” He says haltingly.

It had been his mother’s, for a very long time. The fire lilies Ursa had cultivated there had been all but sacred; there was little Azula could do to get her mother to _actively_ punish her, but burning those flowers did so without fail.

That he would tear it up – the Agni Kai had done little but accelerate his plans, she realizes, not for the first time. He hadn’t intended it to happen, hadn’t intended the results – but it had furthered their plot by _years_ , and she is almost grateful for that.

“What use do I have for a _garden?_ ”

“They were…pyrophytic plants. So you could burn them, and they would grow back. I had it…halfway done. They’ve probably gone wild, now, but…when you’re healed.”

It’s an offer as much as a promise, and Azula closes her eyes to _breathe_ for a few moments.

Summoning her fire scorches her, rattles her wounds from the inside out. Even now, she must smother her inner fire to mere _embers_ so as not to be completely consumed by the agony of it. But – she wants it, _craves_ it. What she wouldn’t give for her sparks now.

“Finish it.” She says, _orders_ , and she can feel his smile even from across the room.

“It can be an engagement gift.” Mai says dryly.

Zuzu _chokes_.

X

“So, how long exactly are you waiting to take care of the…uh. _Mess_ in your prisons?” Toph asks, and Azula shifts into yet another cold kata with a low hum. Yue and Katara and Mai glance up at the two of them curiously, but Katara does not stop in her… _lecture_ on traditional bone-blades.

The ancient traditions of proper courtly ladies, Ty Lee had said, would best suit a nation still convinced its women should be chained to birthing beds. Azula had sneered, but she’d been _right_.

“Mai killed one lone man and your Avatar still can’t look _me_ in the eyes. Once he departs…” She nearly pauses her kata to gesture, but catches herself in time. No eyes to see it, after all.

“…Y’know, I think you should go through ‘em. The Fire Nation really fucked up a lot of the Earth Kingdom, and the Water Tribes. Those that don’t _have_ to die – use ‘em as a labor force.”

It’s both a punishment and a gesture of aide, a mercy and a tool to calm their political enemies. Azula hums again, a little – _deeper_ – and Toph smirks triumphantly.

“That _would_ solve the… _war criminal_ problem we’ll have shortly.”

“Make sure to draft the order specifically enough that it can’t be misconstrued as slavery.” Mai says, and when Azula turns the other girls have drawn closer. Katara already has an orb of water spinning between her hands, and at her look, Azula begins the process of pulling her robe down.

“It’s not like that’d be _that_ big a loss.” She mutters, and Mai _tuts_ at her.

“If you want to spread goodwill, it does. Last thing you need is anyone claiming the Fire Nation has _slaves_.”

They had – or might as well have – under her father’s reign. But Azula sees no need to say that, and neither does Mai.

“Speaking of goodwill.” Yue says, bright and eager and shuffling until she stands within Azula’s eyesight. Azula can’t help but narrow her eyes, even as Katara’s water makes contact with her skin.

“How do you feel about leaving your brother in charge as regent and taking a _brief_ visit to the North Pole to help educate my people? Mai and Ty Lee would also be guests of honor, of course.” Azula doesn’t even think the girl _breathes_ in all that, but – well.

She hums, tilts her head to the side.

The offer is, frankly, the most attractive offered in her budding tenure as Fire Lord. Fire _Lord_ , not Lady. She has two of those. No need to confuse the common rabble as to whom to address.

“I can’t leave Zuzu alone until the matter with our…uncle is handled.”

“I can keep Sparky in check.” Toph says confidently.

“You would be invited too, Toph!”

“Like _fuck_ I’m putting my feet on _ice_. Flying is bad enough – I’ve _heard_ about your city, I’m not going anywhere _near_ that!” Toph’s outrage is entirely performative, though she is serious – on both counts.

“That would be a relief.” Azula says simply. Mai smiles, soft and sweet and hidden beneath her usual mask of indifference, and Toph grins toothily.

“I suppose that makes sense.” Yue murmurs, brows knit together as she frowns. She is peculiar like that. Once confronted with a problem she will frown and mull it over and mumble and think and then spring back to life moments later with a total and complete understanding of whatever she had first missed.

It is _fascinating_ to watch, to see another work through what Azula has learned to do silently and instantly.

“Speaking of your uncle. What’s even going on with that?” Katara asks. Azula shrugs, and winces, and then holds herself especially still for the next few heartbeats.

“Last we heard he’d set up camp with his traitor friends near Ba Sing Se. Zuzu helped Ty Lee send a letter, but we haven’t heard anything back.”

It’s astonishing how casual these girls make her. Not due to Zuzu’s love for them, either, but – for _her_ sake, _her_ company, _her_ companionship. Yue, she understands, feels that chilled heartbeat thump within her own breast. But Toph, wildly viciously and _violently_ overprotective Toph? And Katara, who loathes the Fire Nation with every _drop of blood_ in her being?

It’s a marvel. Yet another thing that has gone so suspiciously well that Azula had set fire to an effigy of Agni in threat.

 _These are mine_ , she’d said. She _thinks_ , _growls_ , as she stands half-undressed in her own courtyard in her own palace before them.

“Can she…not send a letter herself?” Yue asks carefully. Azula snorts at the same time Mai does, but they do not get the chance to reply.

“Well. That’s probably because he decided to come himself.” Toph declares. She’s standing with her feet shoulder-width apart, sightless eyes narrow and head tilted. Her face is angled towards the front of the palace, Azula notes, and she scowls. Mai sighs.

“Toph, you stay here with Katara and Azula. We’ll go…I don’t know. Shunt him off into one of the nasty waiting rooms Ozai boarded up.”

Both Toph and Yue salute, and Yue is still giggling when she follows Mai out. Azula watches them go.

“How bad is this going to be?” Katara asks quietly. Azula almost shrugs again.

The truth of it is; she doesn’t know. She hasn’t bothered with her uncle since he gave her that stupid doll. If he wanted to be like Ursa and not make an effort, she had no obligations to him. And she’s never regretted it – she knows he loves Zuzu, no matter how obsessive or grief-stricken or misguided that adoration is. She’d been glad her brother had had someone trustworthy at his side during his banishment.

But she is not willing to extend goodwill to him. He is a threat, first and foremost.

“I don’t know.” She confesses quietly.

“I think it’ll be fine. But if not. We can take him _easy_.” Toph says firmly, and that’s enough to bring a smile to her face.

X

Her first act as Fire Lord was to send Ty Lee’s family home. Their stares had clung to the Avatar and their youngest, but after Mai had assured them they would return once things had calmed down, they’d gone.

All eight of them had all collectively managed to avoid that entire situation until Azula was capable of movement that would not worsen her wounds further.

Ty Lee wedges herself between Azula and Mai, and keeps her head held high as the Avatar gingerly presses himself against Katara’s side. Zuzu and Sokka are lingering in the background, torn between leaving _whatever_ it is alone and listening in. Azula had had a servant supply them with snacks, and both boys are methodically shoveling food into their mouths while they watch.

Azula sneers at them and takes a dainty sip of her tea. Zuzu has the decency to blush and pick up his spirits-damned chopsticks.

“So Mai said you’re a bender.” The Avatar croaks out. He’s pale and frightened and he is refusing to look directly at Ty Lee. Azula can’t imagine that this isn’t some scenario he’d hoped for _desperately_ , and she’s – fascinated. By his response. He has everything he could ask for laid out in front of him, and he suddenly _doesn’t want it_.

“I don’t know who raised you, but they didn’t do a very good job.” Ty Lee says bluntly, and Katara suddenly has a hand on the Avatar’s arm like _steel_. He’s frozen, looks as if he’s been struck.

“Well. The people _in charge_ , I guess. Someone had to love you, or you wouldn’t have your tattoos.” Ty Lee amends, and somehow that is _worse_.

“Don’t talk about him like that!” The Avatar snarls, and then stutters to a halt.

There is no stray breeze swirling the air around them, stirring their clothes or hair. His rage collapses back into fear, and he leans away from her, back into Katara’s arms.

“I’m not a very strong bender. I just use it for little things. Keeping people from overhearing. Letting people hear things. Balancing better, sometimes. And for chi-blocking.”

“Airbenders chi-block? I thought they were non-benders.” Katara prompts after a moment of silence. Ty Lee shrugs. Azula smirks.

“Well. Um. What I’m saying is – it’s the way things are _now_. But we have records of what things were like _then_ , and I don’t know _why_ but your Temple must have thought you were an outsider, because they didn’t teach you _anything_ important.”

It’s – strange. Odd to sit there silent and reassuring at Ty Lee’s side while she hesitates and stumbles and fumbles through her family’s history, her people’s history, the long and convoluted tragedy of her existence. Azula cannot act, cannot erase the shivering in Ty Lee’s hands or ease the tension in her brow.

And here, too, Ty Lee finally has what she’d asked for in front of her – but at least her trepidation makes _sense_ , Azula thinks spitefully.

She strategically places her hand behind Ty Lee, enough that the other girl can lean into her arm should she need it. Ty Lee does, almost immediately – and she starts to _settle_. Fall back into herself, her confidence.

History writes airbenders off as _nomads_ , not as _nomadic communities_ , and there is a distinction. Community was the all-important end-all be-all of airbender society. This is the true tragedy of Ty Lee’s family; that they had cast her out so completely and carelessly that Azula fears Ty Lee lives only because of her and Mai and Zuzu. And now the Avatar and his friends, maybe. Ty Lee has built her own family, her own community, strong enough to sustain her when her own flesh-and-blood would not.

The truth of the Avatar is this; at some point, his people decided he was not one of them, and denied him every piece of culture and history that came with _community_. Ty Lee sees a kindred soul in him, a potential brother or nephew or cousin or what-have-you that breathes and dances and _floats_ like her.

When the conversation is over and Azula retires for the night, she will write Ty Lee’s family and allow them to return to the palace. For now, she sits, and she listens.

Ty Lee had asked for the Avatar. Azula delivers.

X

She gets around to finally granting her uncle an audience a day and a half later. She’s unimpressed by her uncle’s platitudes, but he seems content and Ty Lee and Zuzu assure her he’s genuine. She’s not convinced, not entirely.

His eyes linger on her arms, on her shoulders. The burns have healed almost entirely now, thanks to Katara, and scarred over impressively. She’s delighted by them, though she needs to apply an obscene amount of cream to them nightly. She hasn’t worn sleeves since her burning.

He’s troubled by her hurts, troubled more by her disregard. She’s no patience for his doddering old fool act or his overtures at family.

“So long as you remain loyal, you can stay.” She says flatly, and rises. She waves a hand dismissively at Zuzu when he goes to stand as well, and he gives her another stupid, soft look before resettling in beside their uncle.

He doesn’t seem to notice the way their uncle looks at _him_ , either, uncertain and unsteady. She wishes, not for the first time, that she could have seen his expression when he’d realized Zuzu was loyal to _her_. It would rival Ozai’s, she thinks.

X

The Kyoshi Warriors arrive the morning of her coronation. Azula wakes to Katara and the Kyoshi leader going through her closet. Yue sits primly at her desk sorting through the paints and creams cluttered there.

“What do you want?”

“ _Battle garb_.” Suki says flatly, and holds up a shimmering golden length of silk.

“Zuko said you still have a story to finish. So. You have to dress the part!”

“And you want me to dress for _battle_.” Azula says flatly, but she is already turning the idea over in her head and it’s – _satisfying_.

Yue hands her a box wrapped in a blue leather ribbon, soft and supple and _strong_ beneath her fingers. Inside is a white powder. _Ash_ , she realizes.

“For warpaint.” Yue says sweetly, and Azula _grins_.

X

When she strides out in front of the Caldera, Azula wears half of her most elegant leather armor suit, matching boots and pants in blood-red and detailed in gold, and Suki’s silk wrapped around her chest. To preserve her modesty, Yue had giggled hysterically, but more to the point – to keep her scars uncovered and unobstructed. They curve over her shoulders, down her arms, her back, across her chest. A shawl, she thinks. Her hair is short, her mouth and eyes bone-white, and cold fire crackles and sparks and hisses beneath every step she takes.

Mai is dressed in rich rubies and blacks, as beautiful and untouchable as ever. Her baby brother sits wide-eyed in her arms in matching silks. Ty Lee wears her pink leathers, her hair long and loose in a way she could never wear during Ozai’s reign. Zuzu stands tall and proud and adoring behind them, drab in his maroons and blacks.

There is a cluster of blues and whites and greens and a single figure in orange standing behind the few Fire Sages she’s not ordered imprisoned. Their eyes are wary and their mouths thin lines as she approaches. They are her uncle’s men, through and through.

She has no hair for a topknot. They do not try to place it on her head.

When she turns to those assembled before her, she sees victory and pride and relief in equal measure. There are servants and civilians, guards and chi-blockers, merchants and sailors. There are Water Tribe warriors and Earth Kingdom soldiers and the whole of the Caldera’s heart arrayed before her. Nearly ever face has blue paint smeared somewhere visible, every braid twined with blue ribbon.

This is a new age, she tells them. Fire Lords are owed absolutely loyalty by their nation. Their nation is owed absolute devotion by its Fire Lord. She’s never been one for tradition, but she is more dragon than child these days.

Agni blazes above her, sears her scars with its warmth and blazes off her father’s crown when Toph steps forward and reshapes it.

Applaud your heroes, she demands. Your Avatar, your warriors, your Prince, your Fire Ladies.

The Sages are white-faced and angry behind her.

Toph gives her rings forged of her father’s greatest obsession, the symbol of every evil and vile and vicious and _cruel_ thing he and his father and his father before him have ever done. One for Mai, one for Ty Lee, and one for herself.

The crowd _roars_.

X

 _dragon_ , it calls her, and she sears the rot from her Nation in a whirlwind of azure flames.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man this chp gave me such whiplash, hope y'all don't mind the shift in tone lmao  
> ANYWAY  
> I've gotten a lot of questions about the same things, so, while this is the last chapter of this fic - I'll update one more time w/answers and explanations for whatever you're curious about. Anything you're confused about, curious about, or just want to know more about; feel free to ask! If you're not interested in that, feel free to ignore the next update. I'll give it a couple days before uploading, so you guys have a little bit of time, and I'll still be answering past comments separately.
> 
> EDIT: I forgot to um. Yeah Yue lives here. This was...originally written in more clearly. But it didn't work out super well. Sorry if that confused anybody lmao.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bonus content

_**QUESTIONS** _

**_Title?_ **

I made it up. Kind of proud of that, because I am Not Good at naming things. Azure = Azula’s flame, Obsidian = her resolve.

**_What Was Zuko’s Plan?_ **

The one and only thing Azula could never do for herself is manage people. So. Zuko whole ass just decided to become a one-man PR team. This was a hell of a lot easier when he was banished, because there on his face was proof his father was an absolute Dick, and he could just start a brawl when anybody insulted her. He started shifting the narrative about Azula from _she’s like that_ to _her father makes her do that_. IE: Azula laughing at the Agni Kai, Mai implying Azula didn’t have to keep hurting servants bc Ozai wasn’t around and Zuko was gone, etc. Prior to the Agni Kai Azula didn’t actually know that Zuko was doing this shit, and after she had to play along. By the time _Azure and Obsidian_ end, she’s still absolutely pissed she can’t keep burning people willy nilly lol.

TLDR; gossip.

**_Why Did Zuko Act?_ **

Azula’s his baby sister. Also this version of Zuko is like, waaaay more chill, and spent waaay more time with Azula, Ty Lee, and Mai. He gets them, they get him, they’re a big happy family. Also all his anger got redirected into stressing out over Azula. Now that she’s Fire Lord and their dad’s dead, he starts expressing himself more and Azula finds nothing funnier than riling him up and tossing him at council members who annoy her.

**_What Did Zuko Do While Off-screen?_ **

He was sent to capture the Avatar. So. He just did it as incompetently as possible, and made it very very clear to the Gaang that he was mostly trying to throw Zhao off their trail. The Gaang was very confused, but adapted, and when Zuko finally flipped shit on Zhao in the North Pole, went _he’s ours_.

**_What Did Agni Want Zuko For?_ **

Agni claims both of our resident Fire siblings as his own because (1) fuck Ozai, and (2), fuck Ozai. This is entirely because of their own actions; Zuko in putting his sister first and Azula in agreeing/going along with that. He sees in them the ability to end Ozai’s reign and return balance to the world. He doesn’t actually _want_ anything specific from them; they’re out there doing their best and that’s enough. Azula takes the throne and overthrows her father, and Zuko begins repairing relations between the Avatar and the Fire Nation, and the Fire Nation and itself. Agni is not a threatening spirit in this fic, other than him fucking w/Azula. He just wants his spirits-damned people to do their spirts-damned job, is that so hard to ask?

And to head that off; Azula threatens him. She’ll get rid of her father and those of the Fire Nation who want the war or would stand against the Avatar, but he can’t have _anybody_ else. The Fire Nation is hers; the Caldera is hers. She absolutely would go kill (a) god for it.

**_What’s Up With The Letters?_ **

You can’t very well overthrow your father’s tyrannical rule with your brother without talking to him. Unfortunately, Azula can’t write Zuko directly – she knows the letter will be intercepted. Luckily for her, she’s got Mai, his Actual Fiancée, right there! Nobody wants to read ten pages of sappy goth poetry, and nobody is gonna thing there’s coded messages about _treason_ in aforementioned shitty poetry. Sometimes Ty Lee writes letters to be as obnoxious and over-the-top as possible (the glitter, the lipstick, the hearts). That just makes it all the less likely it’ll be read, since Ty Lee is well known as a rambler and over-enthusiastic and, worse, _emotional._

**_Ty Lee/Zuko??_ **

So. The thing with Ty Lee, is that her girls are not capable of expressing their emotions. If Azula likes somebody, she can’t smile at them or there will be Consequences, in Ozai’s court. Mai just doesn’t like showing any kind of emotion. So; she is _extra_ touchy and _extra_ loud and _extra_ exuberant, because she’s loving for three people. Zuko’s her Older Brother ™ and nothing is going to change that. Azula couldn’t cry over him, though – and Azula certainly couldn’t risk showing relief that he was okay. Ty Lee? Absolutely.

**Ty Lee/Aang??**

She is VERY excited to find another airbender, and vibrates even harder when she realizes he’s alone. He doesn’t have a community. And when he doesn’t show any sign of recognizing her or understanding her (coded) mentions of ancient airbender scripture, culture, etc – especially of chi-blocking – she’s like. Something’s up. And proceeds to figure out how to forcibly adopt the kid.

Even after she explains everything, Aang remains kind of wary around her. She freaks him out; she’s a reminder of what happened to his people, and of what they became. So he gets _better_ , but he’s still not close with her.

**Iroh??**

Iroh is out here doing his Pai Sho and tea thing, plotting his brother’s murder and his nephew’s ascension to the throne, and when Zuko first meets the Avatar he’s astounded and delighted bc hey look I guess I don’t have to undoctrinate my nephew! He let the Avatar go all by himself!

So he tries to talk to Zuko about it, but like, in proverbs, like he’s been doing. And it goes over Zuko’s head. He realizes what’s going on before Aang shows up and panics to Azula and Co. (the proverb letter). Then just yeets himself out of the situation everytime it comes up.

Iroh doesn’t realize his nephew has _other plots_ going on until he’s ditched at the North Pole. W/out his nephew or contacts w/the Avatar, he goes w/the White Lotus to try and free Ba Sing Se during the Day of Black Sun, while the invasion force is attacking the Caldera. Whereupon he finds the Kyoshi Warriors, and Suki’s like I fucking love your niece.

He realizes he done fucked up.

Post-fic, Iroh tries to be better w/Azula and Zuko both. Azula loses some of her hostility, but they never have the kind of relationship he does w/Zuko. And Azula never learns to like tea.

**_Are They Gay?_ **

Yes. Wasn’t sure how explicit it was going to be/where I was going to end it. The OG draft was a lot more snarky and light-hearted than this ended up being. I didn’t want to add the tag until I knew for sure; it’s been updated.

**What About This Specific Line?**

  * Chp 2: “Zuko’s pinched expression” 
    * Here, Zuko recognizes his sister is upset. That she’s afraid of being upset, and that he’s the cause of it. He is upset by that, and kind of panicking/trying to figure out what to do.
  * Chp 4: “It calls Father Worm. What does it call you?” 
    * In Chp 2, Zuko calls himself a turtleduck and Azula a dragon. Agni refers to them both by these monikers.
    * This is important, because Azula has a Moment. She realizes that the entire plan, of winning over the common people/etc, all depends on them liking _Zuko_ , and him actively rejecting the throne to support _her_. So; if Agni calls Zuko a dragon-child too, it’s because Agni thinks of Zuko as something dangerous and powerful. But; nope, and that’s all she needs to reassure herself that her brother is on her side.
  * Chp 5: “Do you think I care _whose_ womb we will use?” 
    * They’re lesbians Harold
    * Also Azula is trying to rationalize why Mai’s upset. First thing that comes to mind is that Mai thinks Azula wants to be the one to bear their children, but Azula is pro-adoption and pro-surrogacy and gets pissed.
    * She realizes she’s wrong pretty quickly, but she never quite gets that Mai’s just horrified and angry that Azula had to result to permanently maiming herself to be safe from her father’s plans.
  * Chp 5: “They’d plotted without her” 
    * It went like this.
    * Mai cornered Ty Lee. Went. “I get fucking dibs”. Ty Lee was like, okay???
    * Realized Mai meant dibs on killing Ozai.
    * Realized that if the only non-bender among them killed him it would forever shame and dishonor Ozai. Personally; the Fire Nation wouldn’t give a shit ‘cuz dead is dead and Mai is terrifyingly skilled at knives. But Ozai himself? He’d flip shit.
    * Azula realizes they’d discussed it and were doing it for her and is like oh my god what the fuck why do I feel emotions no this isn’t okay.



**Bonus: Re: The Letters**

_What follows was the OG piece I wrote for the Fire Kiddos dealing w/the plot and the letters situation. It got cut, but, enjoy!_

-

Here’s the truth; She’d had Mai write Zuzu a long sappy angsty little piece immediately after his banishment. Zuzu was an idiot, but he wasn’t _stupid_ , and he’d picked up on the code in her poetry immediately. There had been some concern that meant the code was too _weak,_ but Azula had dictated it and it was based on all the pathetic little moments of their shared childhood, so she was fairly confident no one but Uncle Iroh or Father would be able to crack it.

Zuzu had responded with a list of instructions. She had been so angry that he was _finally_ plotting and it was _without_ her that she’d set an entire study ablaze. Mai had barely saved the letter long enough to memorize it.

But – she’d followed them. It was just another act, after all. And he’d told them he was…talking. Telling stories. Toeing the line between outright treason on his search for the Avatar.

Because he’d wanted to find the spirits-damned freak. He’d been desperate to come home. He apologized for leaving her in _every single letter_ and –

Well.

Azula is the monster, the dragon, the nightmare. Zuko is the weakling, the turtleduck, the sweet one. The people had loved him long before his banishment, and they had hated Azula from the moment her Father first told her _burn them_ and she’d obeyed immediately.

The Agni Kai, Zuzu had said, gave them a chance to change that.

So here is the story; the Crown Prince was banished for his compassion, for his love of his people. And the Princess had laughed and smiled as the Fire Lord scorched her brother’s face off, because he had made her promise _she would not be next_. And now the poor girl was alone, trapped beside a father that did not love her and expected awful things of her, and here her brother was still defending her name to anyone and everyone that spoke ill of her. Here was a brother trying desperately to return to his sister’s side, so that he might protect her. And here was a sister, surviving their father’s rage all on her own. _She did as her father commanded_.

The Caldera was insular, isolated. And Father had never appreciated the more subtle political arts. If he ever heard the rumors, which in of itself was improbable, he wouldn’t hear them until they’d sunk their claws into the Fire Nation.

And he hadn’t.

Although, Azula sorely misses being able to punish incompetent help as she sees fit. The sacrifices she makes for her own, she thinks, and sighs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading and enjoying this. I intended to post the first few chapters so I wouldn't forget about it and move on to other things, but your response pushed me through to finishing the fic waaaay sooner than I'd intended <3  
> Stay safe, have a great day/night, and happy halloween!


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